Dear Man Who Got Too Angry About the Bus Driver's Inadvertant Wrong Turn Today,
Was that really such a terrible thing to have happen? Friday afternoon. Spring break is on deck. The driver was clearly a flustered undergrad. He apologized to you. You looked like faculty. You were, let's face it, kind of uncivil about the whole thing. Sitting over his shoulder for the rest of the drive and scolding him for not making a turn when traffic wasn't really favorable? Sheesh. And that exasperated and oh-so-audible comment to whomever was at the other end of your cell phone call; you know, when you said, "I'll be home AS SOON AS THE BUS GETS ME THERE."
Just thought someone should point that out. There are enough publicly angry people already. I know because I counted once.
Humbly,
Riding Silent
Off the nightstand, back up on the shelves.
James Frey, A Million Little Pieces. Yes, but only barely, and not for the reasons I would have imagined. Most of the conversation about this book has only reminded us that the standard approach to memoir remains naive.
Sarah Vowell, The Partly Cloudy Patriot. Yes.
Amy Krouse Rosenthal, Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life. Most Absolutely Yes. A memoir about which we ought to talk.
Joan Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking. An unsettled yes.
Linda Greenlaw, The Hungry Ocean. Yes.
Don Delillo, Libra. Whatever.
One might reasonably hold that one isn't likely to injure onself with a tangerine.
Friends, be careful peeling the skin of this iffy citrus. If you aren't careful, and your finger slips just so, that little remainder of a stem might make an appointment with the underside of your fingernail. And ouch.